Few people came out of the Crimean debacle with credit, but Florence Nightingale's campaign on behalf of the sick and wounded British soldiers was one of the great achievements and made her a national hero. She had travelled to Scutari, a suburb of Constantinople, in October 1854, where she transformed the appalling conditions at the Barrack Hospital and laid the foundations for lasting reforms in nursing care. Clearly highlighted near the centre of Barrett's painting, she is shown receiving casualties in the quadrangle of the hospital.